This invention relates to drive couplings, particularly although not necessarily those direct driving a pump from an engine. The invention has especial, though not limited, application to engine-pump combinations of a unitary type adapted for on-site or in-the-field use, as for example for sanitary and sump pumping.
Engine-pump combinations are known in the art wherein the engine and pump mount in a generally side by side or tandem relation coupled together by interconnecting driving and driven elements. The bringing together of the engine and pump components into an operating combination, particularly the mounting of a pump in an operative, driven relation to an existing or previously installed engine, can be a difficult procedure. This is especially true where the work is to be done under field conditions, without use of factory equipment and by persons having limited skills of the kind required. Serious problems of alignment are inherent in the mating of driving and driven elements of the drive coupling, and in this and other respects the assembling and preparation of an engine-pump combination for use has been an imprecise, generally unsatisfactory procedure. Pump manufacturers have not been able properly to respond to a need for a pump unit which can readily be connected in the field to a variety of engines and achieve therewith a satisfactory mounting and driven relationship. There has, prior to this invention, not been available in the pumping arts a pump specifically adapted to and lending itself to accurate, trouble free installation in connection with a driving engine.
The foregoing is a complete account of pertinent prior art, insofar it is known to those substantively involved in the preparation of this application.